Successful Action - Regular Heart-Healthy Exercise

Ruth Sandra Sperling
Designs In Fiber

I thought I would say some things about something that turned out to be one of the most successful things I ever did exercise-wise in my life.

First of all, lets be honest here - I am not exactly an athlete!!

But I grew up walking (inlcude hiking in nature with that), bicycle-riding, swimming - not necessarily for health, but for recreation. I actually enjoyed doing all of them, though competitive sports was not my "thing".

Around the age of 30, I was looking for a way to do daily exercise that would help me get in better shape including loosing inches, but this was part of a doctor's program to handle some mild problems and loose weight.

I "stumbled" upon a book - and that was the luckiest things I ever did. It was "The Fit or Fat Book" by Covert Bailey.

In that book he explains and outlines how to develop an exercise program for yourself. It is heart-rate monitored aerobic exercise, which does a lot of good things for you. He outlines how you determine what the range of your heart rate should be while you are exercising so that you loose fat and gain leaner muscle and change your metabolism so that you burn more calories. It needs to be steady exercise for a minimum of 12 minutes in your heart range.

I would like to quote from the most recent version of this book that I have:

"Exercise that is hard but not too hard and continuous for a minimum of twelve
minutes, does more to increase fitness than other kinds of exercise.
Aerobic exercise is the most efficient way to remove the marbling fat, which in
turn is the most efficient way to change your metabolism so you won't get fat
anymore. Anything that we do that uses our muscles can be called
exercise. And any exercise, even the household chores I made fun of
earlier, help to keep muscle intact. But to retain a full complement of
muscle, we need exercise that uses it fully. Most people are limited in
the time they can spend on an exercise, and some would prefer not to exercise at
all. So the shortest exercise of greatest efficiency should have wide
appeal."

And this is key to understanding how and what exercise to do:

"The main criterion of aerobic exercise is that it be continuous and
steady. We don't know exactly why that works, but it does. There is
something about pushing a muscle to work hard at a steady pace that leads
quickly to a firming of the muscle and a loss of its marbling. Stop-and-go
exercises just don't do the same thing as quickly."

When I was 30 was almost 27 years ago - and unfortunately, I cannot say that I ever got totally fit or lost all that weight I wanted to loose. And, at different time during the years, there were periods when I just didn't do it.

BUT - AND THIS IS A BIG BUT -- I did it enough so that when I had a serious medical problem like I did 6 years ago, my heart was strong enough to hold up through it.

Since I recovered enough from that medical problem 6 years ago to do exercise, I used Covert Bailey's exercise data to determine how I could exercise with my medical conditions and improve myself and my condition - I knew that aerobic, heart-healthy exercise was key to living the rest of my life and I did it.

In 2006, after I had a monitored study in a hospital, including heart-monitoring, I knew I had done the right thing when the Doctor said to me that even with my medical conditions, the monitored results showed that my heart was fit.

I am not qualified to advise anyone what to do for themselves.

I recommend getting the books by Covert Bailey and reading them from cover to cover. The most recent book that I have is:

"The Complete Fit or Fat Book, The Phenomenal Program that Successfully Guides You from Fatness to Fitness" - It is actually 4 books in one by Covert Bailey and Lea Bishop-mine is a First Galahad Books edition published in 2001.

I got it over the Internet - you can look for these books in bookstores and on the Internet.

Then figure out what you need to do and what you want to do -- and do it.

At my age of 56 1/2 with my medical conditions, I do what I feel is right for me.

To make sure I am keeping in the right heart range, I use a wrist Polar brand heart-rate monitor with a chest strap.

Covert Bailey's books tell you how to monitor your heart rate without one, though.

Now that I have shared with you all my sucess, I think, when I am done here on the Internet, I will go get my Polar heart-rate monitor, put on one of my favorite videos, "Riverdance" - and do this day's aerobic exercise!!

To all of you who read this - I wish you the best sucess in your life!!

Ruth